Tobacco Products Bill

7418 comments sent to parliament (closed 4 September 2023)

The Portfolio Committee on Health invited the public to comment on the Tobacco Products and Electronic Delivery Systems Control Bill.

The objective of the Bill is to:

• • regulate smoking and vaping;
  • regulate the sale and advertising of tobacco products and electronic delivery systems;
  • regulate the packaging and appearance of tobacco products and electronic delivery systems and to make provision for the standardisation of their packaging;
  • provide for standards in respect of the manufacturing and export of tobacco products and electronic delivery systems;
  • prohibit the sale of tobacco products and electronic delivery systems to children;
  • prohibit the free distribution of tobacco products and electronic delivery systems;
  • prohibit the sale of tobacco products and electronic delivery systems by means of vending machines.

Concerns from the industry

• • British American Tobacco SA (BATSA) said the bill would accelerate the destruction of the legal tobacco value chain and permanently entrench a dominant illicit trade, without reducing smoking.
    “Removing unique brand identifiers through plain packaging would make price the primary consumer consideration, causing a shift to cheaper, predominantly illicit, options, and this would make smoking more affordable and likely increase consumption,”
  • Warren Dreyer, owner of a chain of 25 specialist tobacco stores called JJ Cale, which employs 95 people said: “If this Bill is passed, it will mean that as a specialist tobacconist, I will be banned from displaying the actual products that I sell.
  • Limpopo Tobacco Processors, represented by François van der Merwe said: “Government should go back to the drawing board and work on realistic and practical solutions that are based on the economic and social realities of the day – and stop opening up the South African economy to more and more mafia-type, tax-dodging criminal networks. We have enough of those already,”